Great article Derek. One idea you could probably add to the "People are more harried..." topic is the problem of high expectations. I have challenges convincing my spouse to have people over because she is always embarrassed that our house isn't as clean as it should be or we are in the middle of a renovation project leaving a mess in one room. Our house is great, but doesn't meet a level of high expectations. I'm doubtful people in the 1950s had these same concerns.
It's also a matter of design. Modern open concept homes make it hard to hide the mess of daily life, but in the past homes (at least slightly more upscale ones) used to be divided into a public and a private section.
Today the idea of setting aside a room and keeping all the nice furniture under dust covers just for guests would seem a bit antiquated and even frivolous to many though.
Architect Stewart Hicks made a nice video on the disappearance of the parlour.
Yes! We throw a couple of parties a year, and I always have to do a lot of self-talk about how my house is just fine even though it's pretty ragged compared to our friends' houses. But they are all afraid to have people over at all, for fear of social judgment.
I suspect social media has made us all fearful that all our friends are living in these super clean/organized domestic spaces, but it just can't be true. And I bet if our houses are a bit mussed (mine is more than a bit!), it makes everyone relax a little because they feel less alone :)
Page, this is absolutely true. There are a few paragons who keep the Insta aesthetic but by and large, most people are living everyday.
What I’ve told my wife over and over is that if someone is insulted by the untidiness, they won’t come back. But when you get into a routine, everyone comes back almost every time. Maybe they are “judging” the kitchen desk that is NEVER clean, or my desk that is NEVER clean, but they’d rather be together than think too much about it.
David, I think they did have “high expectations” as that seems to be part of human nature from the beginning. But the spread between individuals was more closely bunched (see CEO salaries in the 50s vs now, among many other examples). They worried about what each other thought but the reality was that for most of America, at least, the difference between each class was closer.
With that said, our current technologies make us ruminate on this difference more and do create an obstacle. My bet is that if you think your house is great, your guests would too and they’d probably reciprocate an invite. But that’s just my experience.
30 years ago while we were living in London, we had a group of friends that we would get together with almost every weekend. We'd alternate flats were we'd meet, make a bunch of food, and just hang out. As the years have passed, and we've moved numerous times to multiple places, the hosting and get togethers have diminished. But, even up until about 10 years ago we would at least have a yearly Christmas party and routinely have people over to grill during the summer. But, I noticed a shift even right before Covid. People seemed almost put out by being asked to come over for a get together or party. The fact that people (not the ones hosting mind you) felt as if it took too much effort to even show up was a thing.
Then, Covid pretty much killed socializing at people's homes. I do think the decline has to do with our ability to more easily entertain ourselves without interacting with other people. But, there is also a sense that it's not as important to make the effort - whether that be dressing up or simply making an appearance at a gathering. It is easier to be self-obsessed and consumed. How do we convince people that it might be worth changing our behavior not only for our own wellbeing but the greater good?
I like to tell people that hosting is a life hack. If you host a monthly dinner party, every time you meet someone interesting or think of someone you want to reach out to, you can invite them over to dinner. So much more meaningful than a coffee catch up, and easier to coordinate because you decide the date. And it gets easier and easier the more you do it.
I hosted countless dinners and holiday parties when I started working in the 90s and 00s, including dinner for my entire office in my studio apartment, extremely casual spaghetti dinners in our newly purchased, almost furniture-free house, and Thanksgiving dinners for diplomats. In the late 00s people became less likely to RSVP, more picky about what they would eat, and generally harder to make plans with. Part of this was also people having kids to whom they devoted more and more time (sports, kid parties, etc) and me being out of town a lot of the time. As discussed in the post, it got much worse over the intervening years. One of the effects of covid/remote work is that people do things, including work, on such different schedules that it adds another degree of difficulty to the coordination problem.
So now, unfortunately, I rarely have people over, even though it’s one of my favorite things to do—I love cooking and baking but live in a two-person household. I vastly prefer in-person socializing, don’t do social media, and I watch almost no video and zero short-form. It’s profoundly depressing to me.
The comments noting “standards” are on to something IMO. Try to get over it! I did just have friends over this past weekend. We had a super simple meal of pasta, salad, and an easy apple cake. I didn’t have time to clean. When I was in my entertaining era, I liked to try out fancy recipes sometimes. People would say that they were afraid to invite me over because they didn’t cook much, but I truly didn’t/don’t care! The food isn’t the point, and nobody notices or cares about the state of your house/apartment.
I love this and strongly agree. We have to get back to a place where we get over our own worries about the mess or what's an appropriate level of "fanciness" when it comes to what to serve for dinner, cocktails, etc. I'd argue that simple food like pasta, salad, and apple cake sounds pretty dreamy to me and most people! I hosted a casual author event on my back porch last weekend and a friend expressed disbelief that I was so relaxed about having 40 people over when my house was under construction - she asked if I was having the event catered. I laughed and said I planned on cups of popcorn, icy cold bottles of rose, and seltzer. My daughters made some antipasto skewers with what we had in the fridge. The afternoon was cold and dreary; my friends were so happy to have an excuse to gather together for an hour on a Sunday. Sawdust and store-bought popcorn and no one blinked an eye!
I agree with the sentiment others have expressed that it’s human to want to avoid embarrassment about house/food etc but Social Media has turbo charged the expectations and doubts. I love hosting and cooking but regularly don’t get invited back or comments made about how they cannot “compete” with my cooking. I make the point in vain that if like me you cook everyday having pizza or pasta made by someone else is a joy. My wife constantly freaks out about our place being not good enough/clean enough for guests too. I also think the full body contact parenting has taken a toll as much as remote work and scheduling issues. Long days, ridiculous commutes due to high property prices also a factor and as someone else pointed out the demise of drinking has taken a lot of the fun out of dinner parties.
Great article and good comments - I especially noted the lack of infrastructure in the home - none of my adult kids have a table that can seat more than four and see no issue with that. One thing that I don't think has been mentioned is the role of social media in preempting much of what used to be the conversation at these events. I have already seen your trip to Italy, your kids graduation, etc; I already have noted your political points ( and I don't like them), have found a better person to ask about my car problem, my wilting plants, and have made all the snarky comments I need to make about how rude Phily sports fans are. ( and we know exactly what the weather will be). So what's left ?
We need to normalize potlucks on paper plates in the back yard. And I don't care if you buy your potluck contribution at the grocery store rather than making something. The point should be getting together, not impressing people with your decorating and cooking, or forcing you to spend your free time for the week cleaning your house.
There are a few factors that I believe have added to this equation.
The first is Alcohol. In the 1970s, the three martini lunch was still happening. (I had them when I started working. Three martinis made afternoon meetings much, much better). But over my lifetime, the taxation and social prohibitions on alcohol have made the sin of drinking much more expensive and generally socially unacceptable. Drinking lubricates the social wheels and lessens the need for small-talk savvy. We also know that drinking results in a lot more pregnancies, another social ill that plagues us. The Ken Burns Documentary on Prohibition also looks at the social effects that banning the corner pubs had both on employment, men’s social lives, and politics.
The second is mobility. In the 1970s it was much more likely that kids would go to college, come home and work in a local business (or open one of their own). They could continue to socialize with high-school and even elementary school friends and reminisce over the homecoming game in their junior year. They had long commonality and with a few added drinks, could actually relax in the presence of others. However, as jobs (particularly manufacturing jobs) got shipped overseas, people had to become much more mobile to find work. Fewer and fewer returned home, and inviting someone you just met to your house is very different than inviting the kids who came to sleepovers when you were a kid. It takes a long time to develop the comfort with someone that is equal to that of the friends that legitimately called you booger-head.
The final is income inequality. In the 1970s single earner households were still a possibility. But as the wealth moved up, squeezing the middle class to near non-existence in America, the freedom to entertain disappears. I’ll never understand how the Capitalists fail to grasp the basic math. A robust and well-paid middle class consumes a whole lot more than a few extremely wealthy people. A wealthy person can buy a lot of pants, but a robust middle class buys millions and millions of pairs. That increases the velocity of money and increases their sales. Henry Ford had it right, he was going to pay his people enough to afford his products because he understood at the fundamental level that the movement of money makes the economy tick, not the hoarding nor accumulation. Look at minimum wage in the US. Stagnant for over half of my life. Minimum wage in the US has always been a sorry excuse for an economic policy-it is essentially an excuse for capitalists to say “They aren’t slaves-they get paid!” While workers proclaim “We aren’t slaves, we get paid!”. All bad theater to disguise slavery.
Amanda Litman wrote about her effort to host dinner every single week in 2025. She had a toddler and baby at the time. Key to her success was not feeling like the house had to be sparkling clean (“minimal viable cleanliness”) and hosting dinner early so kids were welcome.
Thank you for writing this! I've seen so much discourse on the lack of third places and not enough on why our 'first places' aren't being used the way they used to.
I've spent the last few years thinking about how to inspire more people to host at home. Coming from a culture (I'm Pakistani) where hosting is a way of life has made it even more confusing to wrap my head around these stats but you've laid it out well.
We've become too transactional and individualistic. Our homes have become sanctuaries instead of social places. We hold ourselves to standards that have been defined by Pinterest and Instagram and it makes the whole thing feel exhausting.
We could all benefit from a societal embrace of casual hosting, but we're never going to remove all the friction or effort. We just need to see the benefit more. It has to feel really good for people to want to do it again and again (I call it the 'hosting high'), and it helps if invites start coming back their way so they aren't the only ones carrying the weight of hosting in their social group.
Yes, and it saddens me. Another disincentive has been the wide array of foods one won't or can't eat. I am almost tempted to have picnic dinners- everyone brings their own lunch bag-maybe I could provide beverages and simple desserts?
I'd be interested in hearing more about how the pandemic accelerated the trend in 2020 as the chart you shared clearly shows a huge jump from 2019 to 2020 and then slowly came back down from 2021-2022. What are these numbers like in 2026? I'd also like to know more about the people who are hosting and attending dinner parties at friends homes. I'm 40 years old with two kids in a dual income household and it took me 9 months to reschedule a family game night with my Boomer parents and Gen Z brother. We were all busy for different reasons (Boomer parents: regular international travel; my family: kids, jobs, chaos; Gen Z brother: career, friends, working out).
Great article @Derek. This trend feels, sadly, irreversible. In the teen years (for me the '70s) getting together with friends - and their families - was regular and normal. Nothing really changed in the '80s other than I was hosting my own parties and get togethers with my friends (college and post college) and that too was a weekly event at a minimum.
In the 1990s I was living in Germany (Duesseldorf) and the parties with neighbors were fantastic and fun - and - bi-weekly and as the local americans we'd be invited to all the time. I really miss those years. The 2000s and 2010s have been a decline in socializing - but living in Del Mar CA I had a great group of friends from South Africa that threw parties frequently and that was a blast while it lasted. But after moving to the bay area (Redwood City CA) socializing had dried up for us. When I try to arrange small gatherings it takes a month to find a time unless it's work related.
A beautiful exception to this trend is our local Latino community. While many of us have drifted away from regular hosting over the past 25 years, they’ve beautifully kept that tradition of family gatherings and neighborly celebrations alive. Many a time I'm walking our dog and there are parties with mariachi bands and laughter and families/friends clearly enjoying themselves.
It really is just a way of life in some communities. I think Americans overthink it with the scheduling and logistics. What if you just set a date a month or two out and every time you think of someone over the next few weeks, invite them?!
Yep - we've had neighbors over and we'll do so later this year. When there was an accident at midnight the other night (nothing serious just a car scraping another parked car) and all the neighbors came out I use that opportunity to invite them to get together.
Another awesome article, thanks so much for writing it. You get at this point without saying it in quite these words so I’ll share something that occurred to me when I read: I don’t live in my hometown (not even close), and I wonder if that’s true for more people today than it was a while back.
The data here is a little old (2015) but it shows that distance from hometown strongly increases with income and education (https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/12/24/upshot/24up-family.html). That doesn't really fit with the finding that poorer and less educated people have the fewest friends, since they are the most likely to live where they grew up.
The same article notes that Americans as an aggregate moved less in ~2010 than in ~1980.
maybe people have just all become more annoying in recent years so nobody wants to get together or maybe that is why i am never invited either way works i suppose
You struck a chord with me! How could I possibly fit entertaining (not to mention house cleaning - gave that up years ago) into my pod and TV schedule?! And the thought of another human violating my sacred space? Fills me with horror.
While I attend a progressive church post pandemic, I grew up in more traditional churches. I still attend a Lutheran camp with my daughters in the summer and the fall. What is fascinating to me is that even though these children have no memory of living in community, it generally takes less than 24 hours for them to start acting like the kids I grew up with (in good and bad ways!) when they are stripped of the disruptions of the modern technology.
We entertain frequently at our house, despite the fact that it’s never “perfect.” We’ve realized that if we can just get people in the door, it takes very little to get them to “act” like the 1950s, including occasionally guests imbibing too much. Our only rule is that we keep the phone usage limited. We put chairs in front of the TV. We put a record on the record player. It’s never gone poorly and for my Millennial wife, it’s all she’s ever wanted. For my Gen X brain, it feels like the life my grandparents had more than the life my parents lived and I’d take that trade every time.
Anyway, try out hosting. It is the best medicine and it’s often contagious.
Great article Derek. One idea you could probably add to the "People are more harried..." topic is the problem of high expectations. I have challenges convincing my spouse to have people over because she is always embarrassed that our house isn't as clean as it should be or we are in the middle of a renovation project leaving a mess in one room. Our house is great, but doesn't meet a level of high expectations. I'm doubtful people in the 1950s had these same concerns.
It's also a matter of design. Modern open concept homes make it hard to hide the mess of daily life, but in the past homes (at least slightly more upscale ones) used to be divided into a public and a private section.
Today the idea of setting aside a room and keeping all the nice furniture under dust covers just for guests would seem a bit antiquated and even frivolous to many though.
Architect Stewart Hicks made a nice video on the disappearance of the parlour.
https://youtu.be/Vu6VyRcI8eA?is=qPEAIKnThFUK-efP
Yes! We throw a couple of parties a year, and I always have to do a lot of self-talk about how my house is just fine even though it's pretty ragged compared to our friends' houses. But they are all afraid to have people over at all, for fear of social judgment.
I suspect social media has made us all fearful that all our friends are living in these super clean/organized domestic spaces, but it just can't be true. And I bet if our houses are a bit mussed (mine is more than a bit!), it makes everyone relax a little because they feel less alone :)
Page, this is absolutely true. There are a few paragons who keep the Insta aesthetic but by and large, most people are living everyday.
What I’ve told my wife over and over is that if someone is insulted by the untidiness, they won’t come back. But when you get into a routine, everyone comes back almost every time. Maybe they are “judging” the kitchen desk that is NEVER clean, or my desk that is NEVER clean, but they’d rather be together than think too much about it.
David, I think they did have “high expectations” as that seems to be part of human nature from the beginning. But the spread between individuals was more closely bunched (see CEO salaries in the 50s vs now, among many other examples). They worried about what each other thought but the reality was that for most of America, at least, the difference between each class was closer.
With that said, our current technologies make us ruminate on this difference more and do create an obstacle. My bet is that if you think your house is great, your guests would too and they’d probably reciprocate an invite. But that’s just my experience.
30 years ago while we were living in London, we had a group of friends that we would get together with almost every weekend. We'd alternate flats were we'd meet, make a bunch of food, and just hang out. As the years have passed, and we've moved numerous times to multiple places, the hosting and get togethers have diminished. But, even up until about 10 years ago we would at least have a yearly Christmas party and routinely have people over to grill during the summer. But, I noticed a shift even right before Covid. People seemed almost put out by being asked to come over for a get together or party. The fact that people (not the ones hosting mind you) felt as if it took too much effort to even show up was a thing.
Then, Covid pretty much killed socializing at people's homes. I do think the decline has to do with our ability to more easily entertain ourselves without interacting with other people. But, there is also a sense that it's not as important to make the effort - whether that be dressing up or simply making an appearance at a gathering. It is easier to be self-obsessed and consumed. How do we convince people that it might be worth changing our behavior not only for our own wellbeing but the greater good?
I like to tell people that hosting is a life hack. If you host a monthly dinner party, every time you meet someone interesting or think of someone you want to reach out to, you can invite them over to dinner. So much more meaningful than a coffee catch up, and easier to coordinate because you decide the date. And it gets easier and easier the more you do it.
I hosted countless dinners and holiday parties when I started working in the 90s and 00s, including dinner for my entire office in my studio apartment, extremely casual spaghetti dinners in our newly purchased, almost furniture-free house, and Thanksgiving dinners for diplomats. In the late 00s people became less likely to RSVP, more picky about what they would eat, and generally harder to make plans with. Part of this was also people having kids to whom they devoted more and more time (sports, kid parties, etc) and me being out of town a lot of the time. As discussed in the post, it got much worse over the intervening years. One of the effects of covid/remote work is that people do things, including work, on such different schedules that it adds another degree of difficulty to the coordination problem.
So now, unfortunately, I rarely have people over, even though it’s one of my favorite things to do—I love cooking and baking but live in a two-person household. I vastly prefer in-person socializing, don’t do social media, and I watch almost no video and zero short-form. It’s profoundly depressing to me.
The comments noting “standards” are on to something IMO. Try to get over it! I did just have friends over this past weekend. We had a super simple meal of pasta, salad, and an easy apple cake. I didn’t have time to clean. When I was in my entertaining era, I liked to try out fancy recipes sometimes. People would say that they were afraid to invite me over because they didn’t cook much, but I truly didn’t/don’t care! The food isn’t the point, and nobody notices or cares about the state of your house/apartment.
I love this and strongly agree. We have to get back to a place where we get over our own worries about the mess or what's an appropriate level of "fanciness" when it comes to what to serve for dinner, cocktails, etc. I'd argue that simple food like pasta, salad, and apple cake sounds pretty dreamy to me and most people! I hosted a casual author event on my back porch last weekend and a friend expressed disbelief that I was so relaxed about having 40 people over when my house was under construction - she asked if I was having the event catered. I laughed and said I planned on cups of popcorn, icy cold bottles of rose, and seltzer. My daughters made some antipasto skewers with what we had in the fridge. The afternoon was cold and dreary; my friends were so happy to have an excuse to gather together for an hour on a Sunday. Sawdust and store-bought popcorn and no one blinked an eye!
Sounds like a very fun time!
I really wish people wouldn't worry so much. Instagram posts ≠ real life (and it's better that way)...
I agree with the sentiment others have expressed that it’s human to want to avoid embarrassment about house/food etc but Social Media has turbo charged the expectations and doubts. I love hosting and cooking but regularly don’t get invited back or comments made about how they cannot “compete” with my cooking. I make the point in vain that if like me you cook everyday having pizza or pasta made by someone else is a joy. My wife constantly freaks out about our place being not good enough/clean enough for guests too. I also think the full body contact parenting has taken a toll as much as remote work and scheduling issues. Long days, ridiculous commutes due to high property prices also a factor and as someone else pointed out the demise of drinking has taken a lot of the fun out of dinner parties.
Agreed on all of this!!!! But it all can still be done and it makes life far richer.
Great article and good comments - I especially noted the lack of infrastructure in the home - none of my adult kids have a table that can seat more than four and see no issue with that. One thing that I don't think has been mentioned is the role of social media in preempting much of what used to be the conversation at these events. I have already seen your trip to Italy, your kids graduation, etc; I already have noted your political points ( and I don't like them), have found a better person to ask about my car problem, my wilting plants, and have made all the snarky comments I need to make about how rude Phily sports fans are. ( and we know exactly what the weather will be). So what's left ?
We need to normalize potlucks on paper plates in the back yard. And I don't care if you buy your potluck contribution at the grocery store rather than making something. The point should be getting together, not impressing people with your decorating and cooking, or forcing you to spend your free time for the week cleaning your house.
Once again, well done.
There are a few factors that I believe have added to this equation.
The first is Alcohol. In the 1970s, the three martini lunch was still happening. (I had them when I started working. Three martinis made afternoon meetings much, much better). But over my lifetime, the taxation and social prohibitions on alcohol have made the sin of drinking much more expensive and generally socially unacceptable. Drinking lubricates the social wheels and lessens the need for small-talk savvy. We also know that drinking results in a lot more pregnancies, another social ill that plagues us. The Ken Burns Documentary on Prohibition also looks at the social effects that banning the corner pubs had both on employment, men’s social lives, and politics.
The second is mobility. In the 1970s it was much more likely that kids would go to college, come home and work in a local business (or open one of their own). They could continue to socialize with high-school and even elementary school friends and reminisce over the homecoming game in their junior year. They had long commonality and with a few added drinks, could actually relax in the presence of others. However, as jobs (particularly manufacturing jobs) got shipped overseas, people had to become much more mobile to find work. Fewer and fewer returned home, and inviting someone you just met to your house is very different than inviting the kids who came to sleepovers when you were a kid. It takes a long time to develop the comfort with someone that is equal to that of the friends that legitimately called you booger-head.
The final is income inequality. In the 1970s single earner households were still a possibility. But as the wealth moved up, squeezing the middle class to near non-existence in America, the freedom to entertain disappears. I’ll never understand how the Capitalists fail to grasp the basic math. A robust and well-paid middle class consumes a whole lot more than a few extremely wealthy people. A wealthy person can buy a lot of pants, but a robust middle class buys millions and millions of pairs. That increases the velocity of money and increases their sales. Henry Ford had it right, he was going to pay his people enough to afford his products because he understood at the fundamental level that the movement of money makes the economy tick, not the hoarding nor accumulation. Look at minimum wage in the US. Stagnant for over half of my life. Minimum wage in the US has always been a sorry excuse for an economic policy-it is essentially an excuse for capitalists to say “They aren’t slaves-they get paid!” While workers proclaim “We aren’t slaves, we get paid!”. All bad theater to disguise slavery.
I wonder how much the reduction in alcohol consumption plays a role? Hell may be other people, but they're a bit less held when we're a bit more drunk
Amanda Litman wrote about her effort to host dinner every single week in 2025. She had a toddler and baby at the time. Key to her success was not feeling like the house had to be sparkling clean (“minimal viable cleanliness”) and hosting dinner early so kids were welcome.
https://amandalitman.substack.com/p/our-year-of-saturday-dinners
Thank you for writing this! I've seen so much discourse on the lack of third places and not enough on why our 'first places' aren't being used the way they used to.
I've spent the last few years thinking about how to inspire more people to host at home. Coming from a culture (I'm Pakistani) where hosting is a way of life has made it even more confusing to wrap my head around these stats but you've laid it out well.
We've become too transactional and individualistic. Our homes have become sanctuaries instead of social places. We hold ourselves to standards that have been defined by Pinterest and Instagram and it makes the whole thing feel exhausting.
We could all benefit from a societal embrace of casual hosting, but we're never going to remove all the friction or effort. We just need to see the benefit more. It has to feel really good for people to want to do it again and again (I call it the 'hosting high'), and it helps if invites start coming back their way so they aren't the only ones carrying the weight of hosting in their social group.
Yes, and it saddens me. Another disincentive has been the wide array of foods one won't or can't eat. I am almost tempted to have picnic dinners- everyone brings their own lunch bag-maybe I could provide beverages and simple desserts?
I'd be interested in hearing more about how the pandemic accelerated the trend in 2020 as the chart you shared clearly shows a huge jump from 2019 to 2020 and then slowly came back down from 2021-2022. What are these numbers like in 2026? I'd also like to know more about the people who are hosting and attending dinner parties at friends homes. I'm 40 years old with two kids in a dual income household and it took me 9 months to reschedule a family game night with my Boomer parents and Gen Z brother. We were all busy for different reasons (Boomer parents: regular international travel; my family: kids, jobs, chaos; Gen Z brother: career, friends, working out).
Great article @Derek. This trend feels, sadly, irreversible. In the teen years (for me the '70s) getting together with friends - and their families - was regular and normal. Nothing really changed in the '80s other than I was hosting my own parties and get togethers with my friends (college and post college) and that too was a weekly event at a minimum.
In the 1990s I was living in Germany (Duesseldorf) and the parties with neighbors were fantastic and fun - and - bi-weekly and as the local americans we'd be invited to all the time. I really miss those years. The 2000s and 2010s have been a decline in socializing - but living in Del Mar CA I had a great group of friends from South Africa that threw parties frequently and that was a blast while it lasted. But after moving to the bay area (Redwood City CA) socializing had dried up for us. When I try to arrange small gatherings it takes a month to find a time unless it's work related.
A beautiful exception to this trend is our local Latino community. While many of us have drifted away from regular hosting over the past 25 years, they’ve beautifully kept that tradition of family gatherings and neighborly celebrations alive. Many a time I'm walking our dog and there are parties with mariachi bands and laughter and families/friends clearly enjoying themselves.
It really is just a way of life in some communities. I think Americans overthink it with the scheduling and logistics. What if you just set a date a month or two out and every time you think of someone over the next few weeks, invite them?!
Yep - we've had neighbors over and we'll do so later this year. When there was an accident at midnight the other night (nothing serious just a car scraping another parked car) and all the neighbors came out I use that opportunity to invite them to get together.
Another awesome article, thanks so much for writing it. You get at this point without saying it in quite these words so I’ll share something that occurred to me when I read: I don’t live in my hometown (not even close), and I wonder if that’s true for more people today than it was a while back.
The data here is a little old (2015) but it shows that distance from hometown strongly increases with income and education (https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/12/24/upshot/24up-family.html). That doesn't really fit with the finding that poorer and less educated people have the fewest friends, since they are the most likely to live where they grew up.
The same article notes that Americans as an aggregate moved less in ~2010 than in ~1980.
The data behind the 2026 numbers (https://www.filesforprogress.org/datasets/2026/9/dfp_social_activity_battery.pdf) also shows that the group most likely to have entertained at home in the past year is college graduates. Only 21% haven't, against 39% of respondents with no college.
"Nearly 60% of young adults live within just 10 miles of where they grew up, and about 80% live within 100 miles" (https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2022/07/theres-no-place-like-home.html)
Additionally, demographic research tracking multi-generational families shows that the median distance Americans live from their mothers is only 18 miles (https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/12/24/upshot/24up-family.html)
maybe people have just all become more annoying in recent years so nobody wants to get together or maybe that is why i am never invited either way works i suppose
You struck a chord with me! How could I possibly fit entertaining (not to mention house cleaning - gave that up years ago) into my pod and TV schedule?! And the thought of another human violating my sacred space? Fills me with horror.
While I attend a progressive church post pandemic, I grew up in more traditional churches. I still attend a Lutheran camp with my daughters in the summer and the fall. What is fascinating to me is that even though these children have no memory of living in community, it generally takes less than 24 hours for them to start acting like the kids I grew up with (in good and bad ways!) when they are stripped of the disruptions of the modern technology.
We entertain frequently at our house, despite the fact that it’s never “perfect.” We’ve realized that if we can just get people in the door, it takes very little to get them to “act” like the 1950s, including occasionally guests imbibing too much. Our only rule is that we keep the phone usage limited. We put chairs in front of the TV. We put a record on the record player. It’s never gone poorly and for my Millennial wife, it’s all she’s ever wanted. For my Gen X brain, it feels like the life my grandparents had more than the life my parents lived and I’d take that trade every time.
Anyway, try out hosting. It is the best medicine and it’s often contagious.